LHC dismisses plea, allows Ishaq Dar to contest Senate elections

Lahore High Court (LHC) on Friday rejected a plea deamnding to cancel candidacy of former finance minister Ishaq Dar for Senate elections and allowed him to contest the polls.
A two-member full bench conducted hearing on Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader Nawabzada Nawazish Ali‘s plea during which, the petitioner said that Dar is a proclaimed accused in Panama Leaks case due to which he cannot participate in the elections.
The claimant requested the court to annul the verdict of allowing former minister to contest Senate polls.
Subsequently, the court dismissed the plea and upheld its decision.
The ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) had nominated Ishaq Dar as its Senate candidate for another three-year term as nine of the PML-N Senators are due to retire next month after completing their terms.
The papers were rejected by Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) which was in LHC’s appellate tribunal. He had adopted stance that the returning officer rejected the nomination papers contrary to the facts.
The court after hearing the arguments of both the parties permitted Dar to take part in Senate elections. Moreover, Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi’s sister Sadia Abbasi and Nuzhat Sadiq were also allowed to contest the Senate polls.
In December 2017, the anti-corruption court had declared Dar, currently seeking medical treatment in London, an “absconder” after he repeatedly failed to appear before it in a graft case linking to the Panama Papers scandal.
He was indicted in October last year in a graft case in which he is accused of making assets that were “disproportionate to his known sources of income”.
The case was filed against him by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) in the light of the Supreme Court order of July 28 that disqualified Nawaz Sharif as prime minister in the Panama Papers scandal.
In its case against Dar, the NAB has alleged that the accused has acquired assets and pecuniary interests/resources in his own name and/or in the name of his dependants of an approximate amount of Rs 831.678 million.
Dar is in London since October and has been seeking treatment of an undefined heart complication at a Harley Street hospital.